by K.N. Lee
Tom stood by himself beside Hagan’s body. Then with a grim smile, he too knelt and bowed his head.
Anna hugged Gilly close. Marton’s arms wrapped both women closer to him. Gilly’s heart warmed. Perhaps he didn’t hate her and her magic so much then. Anna’s children ran to be included in that family moment.
From that point on, nothing Gilly could say would dissuade the Rycan Warriors from accompanying her and her family to Tibor. Anna looked on with a wide satisfied grin. “We’ll have help for our quest then. Good.”
Gilly gave in with grace. Mainly because she had no choice in the matter. “If we’re to set off for Tibor, we had better do so before the horsemen rally and return with reinforcements.”
Tom gave her a nod of encouragement before he too left to get ready for the journey ahead.
Soon Gilly stood alone on the quiet, empty street. Heart hammering in excitement, she whispered, “Hang on a little longer, Mam. We’re coming for you.”
When it was time to depart Perm, Cullen was nowhere to be found. He might have returned to their tent outside the gates when the fighting began and found himself locked out. Just as well, Gilly decided. He had shown no liking for magic and in all likelihood, would have turned against her and Anna.
At hearing the news about Cullen’s absence, Marton muttered, “Good riddance,” reflecting most of the group’s feelings on the matter.
Gilly nodded, but a tiny part deep inside her wondered if Marton would say the same if she disappeared.
At nightfall, the Rycan Warriors escorted them into an underground tunnel. A torch held at the lead and one at the back highlighted their eerily silent trek through the mountain’s interior. The warriors promised this path would save them two days travel overland and leave the King’s Horsemen in their dust.
It was an interminable never-ending journey. The moment they reached fresh air, Gilly took a big relieved breath. Her neck muscles were stiff from stooping even though there had been ample room to stand straight. She rolled her shoulders to relieve her lingering tension and then caught sight of their location.
They were on the side of a narrow mountain trail, so high up, if she reached out, she might touch the sky. Having lived on flat plains most of her life, being this elevated had her hugging the side of the mountain she had just been itching to get out of.
Tom was at her side, pulling her close to his chest and it was the most comforting feel Gilly had ever experienced. As she rested her head on his shoulder, he whispered, “You’re safe.”
Oddly, with him in her arms, she did feel safe. How odd. A brand new experience. Even while she stood on a precipice. Slowly, together, they followed the rest of her party on the trail downward. Thankfully, no one asked her to mount a horse while up here. Though she might have allowed Tom to pull her away from the mountainside, she wasn’t ready to have her feet leave the ground. The downward trek was harder on her leg than climbing up to Perm.
Once the trail widened, they mounted horses before continuing the journey. Tom stayed nearby the whole time. His concern warmed her heart and made the ride almost pleasurable, as long as she did not look to her left where the track seemed to drop off into a valley far below.
By sunset, having ridden for hours, Gilly’s left leg was seriously stiff and beginning to cramp as they entered a resting spot near the mountain’s base. Tom moved away to speak to the warriors about how they should set up a perimeter watch.
“Are you all right?” Anna asked, coming up to her side. “You look as white as the mountain top.”
“Didn’t you find it hard being so high up?” Gilly asked.
“Loved it,” Anna said with a wide smile. “I can see myself living up here one day. I suggested to Marton that mountain cities needed blacksmiths too. He didn’t say, No.” She leaned in and whispered, “I think he liked Perm.”
As that startling news sank in, Gilly wondered how she would fare living up a mountain for the rest of her life. She shivered, her body rejecting the alarming thought. Still, it would be far from Tibor and the king, and if she could be with Anna, she should have to give the idea serious consideration. Leaving her sister was not an option. But that future depended on how this rescue mission fared.
Another worry instantly reared. One she had been mulling over since that terrible destructive fight in Perm. Once they reached Tibor, the Rycan Warriors would need to defend themselves better than they had in their home city. She was unwilling to witness Tom’s or anyone else’s head being hacked off as Hagan’s had been. She shivered, for that vision still haunted her.
However good her new friends’ intentions, well-trained King’s Warriors could slay these shopkeepers faster than she could swat flies. So Gilly asked Talus to give Tom and the other men lessons in swordplay.
To her surprise, since it had been Talus’ kind who slaughtered their comrades during the Makakala Wars, the Rycan Warriors were all on side to train with Talus. As the King’s Warrior began the first practice session, it soon became obvious what the Rycan Warriors had wanted. A chance to fight Talus. The men soon discovered, however, that overwhelming Talus was easier conceived than achieved. And learned why Talus’s comrades had so successfully beaten down the Rycan Warriors.
Everyone, even Talus, went to bed looking bone weary. Gilly and Anna exchanged knowing glances, and by mutual consent, kept their opinions to themselves. Best to let the men work out this issue for themselves. Over the course of the next week, as Talus pinpointed and worked on everyone’s strengths and weaknesses, the practice sessions evolved into true training exercises, rather than a chance to batter each other at will.
As the days wore on, the group worked its way out of the Makakala range of mountains. The surroundings changed from hilly to flat rolling green terrain that stretched far ahead. According to Talus, in less than two weeks they would reach the east coast of Ryca.
Like the landscape, Tom too seemed to be changing. His wounds healed, and lack of the brew brought a healthy gleam to his face. Regular exercise added muscle to his figure and one day, Gilly realized he had transformed into the warrior Jarrod named him in the Telling Ceremony.
Surprisingly, even though Tom’s training had been her idea, Gilly grew resentful of his busy schedule. He’d not said a suggestive word or approached her intimately since Perm.
In fact, he seemed to have forgotten her. For a man who had purported to follow her his whole life, could he not ask how she fared? Did her leg hurt? Was she comfortable? He seemed more concerned with training with the warriors than spending time with her. He even spent all his time riding glued beside Talus, peppering him with questions about training techniques.
Most nights Gilly sat in a secluded place to care for her leg. Each stroke of her hand evoked delicious memories of Tom’s touch. And whenever Marton gave Anna a hand up from the campfire and led her off to their sleeping pallet, Gilly’s chest tightened with longing for Tom to do the same with her.
Of course, she was being silly. She had decided a long time ago that the life a woman enjoyed with a man could never be hers. Given a choice between a sound woman and one hindered by a deformity, what strong healthy man would choose the latter?
The self-pity in that thought irked, so she shook it off. Then turned back to the same topic and blamed her obsession with Tom on him too. She wouldn’t even be considering the possibility of a relationship with him if he hadn’t run his hands up her leg so wantonly that one night. Why couldn’t he have left her in peaceful ignorance of the reaction a man’s hands could arouse in her body? Now, instead of tossing at night in fear of attacking horsemen, she slept fitfully dreaming of Tom’s hands roving up her calf and over her knee.
Lack of sleep was also making her bad tempered. If she kept this up, she wouldn’t have to worry about any man wanting to spend time with her. No one would. One night, annoyance turned to frustration, and Gilly rose to seek solace in privacy.
Her self-appointed bodyguards jumped up to follow. With a sigh, she strolled into t
he night ignoring their quiet shuffle behind her. She sat by an outcropping to stare at the midnight sky. Before long their soft snores reached her.
She smiled with indulgence. Their devotion to her safety was rather sweet, if short lived. Few people had shown her such caring. When she lived at the cottage with Mam, most of her time had been spent alone at Lookout Point. In Nadym, the women in the village shunned her and the men didn’t notice her. Now, family, friends and warriors surrounded her at every waking moment. Strange then that she still felt so alone.
Soft tones of sleeping drifted in the breeze. It would be easy to step away now but she couldn’t do it. Although her guards believed they watched over her, over the course of the last few days, she’d begun to feel as if it were she who guarded them.
At the clip of boots on rock, the snores abruptly ceased. They were no longer alone. Mumbled voices were followed by the sound of her guards retreating.
“So much solitude can’t be healthy for a soul.” Tom sat beside her bringing his heady male scent with him.
She felt light-headed until she realized she had breathed him in too deeply and was now holding her breath. Her breath gushed out in a sigh. “Hardly solitude, with three such stalwart guards.”
“I know you could have lost them if you wished,” he said, “but it makes them feel good and it makes me feel better to know you are not alone.”
Gilly gave him a side-glance, noting his frown. She hadn’t thought he’d noticed her at all lately.
“Your sister misses your company,” he said, when she didn’t reply.
“Anna? Did she say so?”
“She didn’t have to. Her gaze rarely wanders from you. Even the children have mentioned that you seem not to like them anymore.”
“Of course, I like them.”
“It’s hard to tell when you speak no more than one or two words a day.”
She went quiet. He was right. She had unconsciously distanced herself from her family. Perhaps partly due to Marton’s harsh reaction to learning she cast spells, hinting he didn’t want her to be a bad influence on his family. But if she were honest, it was also due to her secrets being exposed. She had always hidden from people and emotional ties. It had been a necessity of life. Now, there was nothing to hide behind, leaving her exposed.
“I’ll speak to them,” she whispered, her chest tightening at the idea that she might have inadvertently hurt those she loved.
“What about the rest of us? I worry as well. It isn’t good to spend so much time alone.” He laughed softly but there was a harsh edge to it. “Don’t want you getting ideas about going off on your own. We’re all in this together.”
She looked away. “You needn’t worry that the princess you’ve guarded all of your life will leave without warning, Tom. At least, not yet.”
He took her hand and wove his fingers through hers. “Not ever.”
His strength had increased; she felt it in his touch. It was intoxicating. But did he expect to guard her forever? She had been hoping for more between them. There was that hateful word again. Hope. Her mouth soured on the word as if she’d bitten into a rotten apple.
She pictured Tom, married with children of his own, coming every day to keep an eye on old Princess Saira-Gilly, unmarried with just goats for company. It was more than she could bear. She pulled free. “Once we find my mother, she will become your primary responsibility. Then it will be time for you to let me go.”
“Is that what you want?”
“What I want doesn’t matter.”
Abruptly he stood. “You’ve been alone so long, Saira, you’ve forgotten how to love. It involves touching and talking, giving and taking. Let those who love you know when you’re ready to remember.”
He retreated to camp and in moments her guards returned to their post. She continued her contemplation of the stars, trying to ignore the tears that slid down her cheeks and the ghostly feel of Tom’s fingers threaded through her heart.
She slept fitfully that night, dreaming of Hagan’s disembodied head glowing amid a dark cloud and then Tom walking away, holding another woman’s hand as he had held hers tonight.
She awoke with a start, heart pounding, the cry, Come back, on the tip of her tongue.
Jarrod was sitting beside her bedroll.
When she would have spoken, he placed his slender black finger across her lips. He gave a head tilt, as if to say, Follow me, and then stood and walked away.
Gilly pulled on her boots, excitement at seeing Jarrod and a bit of lingering fear from her recent dreams coursing through her. Why was he here? Did trouble brew nearby? Jarrod was far to her left now, a silent silhouette.
She stood, trying to be both careful and quiet. Astonishingly, she didn’t trip over anything as she left. Even her ever vigilant guards didn’t notice her passing right beside them.
Could Jarrod’s magic be at play? His people were incredibly talented at moving through Rycan society without leaving an impression. Hopefully the Light magic he used was the kind Tamarisk could not trace.
By the time she caught up to him, the horizon was dark with hints of lightness in the east. Once they were both out of earshot, she touched his arm and asked “Are you real?”
“Gilly,” he turned to face her, “your sleep was troubled.”
She wiped crusts out of the corner of her eyes and cheeks, and then ran a self-consciously hand over her hair. She had no wish to discuss her confusion over Tom. “I seem doomed to be the cause of death to all leaders I meet, Jarrod. It’s not wise to spend so much time in my company.”
“A defeatist attitude. And after such a resounding victory in Perm.”
“How long will that lucky streak last?” She leaned back against a large boulder and stared out at the lonely landscape. Still a sennight’s journey before they would reach the coast and Tibor. “The King’s Horsemen are after us, Jarrod. We’re heading for his city, where, notified by the horsemen, he will no doubt have a contingent of his warriors waiting to capture us. It would be simpler to let the horsemen take me.”
“On that we agree,” he said.
“Oh.” Her attention swung back. “Are we doomed?”
He came over to rest against her boulder. “It isn’t only the King’s Warriors that will greet you in Tibor. Tamarisk uses a deadly black cloud to protect himself. He’s been reinforcing it lately, probably in anticipation of your arrival. It is capable of destroying anything it touches.”
Gilly stared at him in stunned silence. What was there to say to that? A slow anger burned in her heart. “How can you stay so calm and tell me my entire family and all my friends are about to be destroyed? Have you no feeling?”
“I care, Gilly. Deeply. Why else would I be here?”
“Then you have a plan? To defeat this cloud thing.”
“Only you can destroy it. All I can do is warn. Even that violates my people’s laws of non-interference.”
She grabbed at Jarrod’s tunic and pulled him closer. “Would a weather spell conquer it? Can a ward keep us safe? If I blow on it, will it dissipate?”
Jarrod tipped his head back and laughed.
Thoroughly disgusted, she pushed him away and moved around the boulder until she had her back to him. “I’m glad you find my dilemma amusing.”
His laughter faded into a quiet chuckle. “No, merely your turn of mind. I cannot laugh at your troubles, for they are indeed grave. Be wary of what lies ahead in Tibor.”
Gilly contemplated the moon. The first had risen this night, smallest of the three sisters. The horsemen behind her, a deadly cloud ahead. No idea of how to defeat either. She supposed she should be glad Jarrod had come to warn her. It gave her party an opportunity to re-assess their chances of survival. Especially, Anna and the children.
She turned back to him. “Jarrod, will you…”
He was gone. As quietly as he’d arrived, the Chief Councilor of Erov had taken his leave. The man was a mystery, both in his manner of arrival and departure, and in his
knowledge of coming events. Yet, she trusted him. If he said, beware, that was what she planned to do.
She shivered, thinking she’d never heard of anything as destructive as what Jarrod described. Danger had stalked her steps all her life, yet it had been of the variety she could see and touch. Men with weapons and a leader bent on her family’s eradication. This cloud thing she couldn’t explain or reason away and she had no idea how to defeat it.
Her first instinct was to take her family and run away. But this time she couldn’t. Not with Mam and her brother and sister relying on her to save them. So what could she do?
An idea instantly formed but it was a dangerous move. One she’d tried before, and failed at abysmally. Did she dare do it again? Yes! For there could be no more running away. But she needed help.
Gilly walked back to camp, her thoughts battling between a plan to cast an enchantment alone or ask her sister for help. Before she arrived at the camp, she heard a sentry call out, “Missus Gilly is returning.”
It was still not quite light yet. What could have aroused everyone? She turned a corner and arrived back at camp to find everyone dressed and ready to leave. Even the fire had been put out. But instead of heading east, they were facing west, the direction in which she had walked off with Jarrod.
Looking into everyone’s concerned gazes, her decision solidified. Tom was right. She had family and friends who wanted to be a part of her life. Time she let them in.
Anna, with arms crossed, watched her return with a narrow-eyed stare that would have normally set all of Gilly’s alarms ringing. This time, she faced her sister with her chin raised. She needed Anna’s help. Correction, she needed everyone’s help.
“I plan to try and contact Mam,” she said, addressing everyone. “But Tamarisk might trace that seeking back to me, so I need Anna to help me if the backlash hurts me. And all of you to watch over her, in case she’s harmed.”
The resounding silence after Gilly laid out her plan had her on edge. Her toes curled waiting for someone, anyone, to speak their mind.
